Mapping Winter

by Marta Randall

  The red-haired soldier’s name was Glyn. Her smaller companion was called Puwan. They sat with their boots stretched toward the warmth of the wood stove and their swords within easy reach. They said that Ilach had commanded their presence and there was nothing they or Kieve could do about it. They had no word about Daenet and would have none until the morning. Outside, wind banged and shouted against the door, and Lapsi sniffled in his sleep.

  Chapter 8

  The furs on her bed were stiff with cold. She gathered them up and brought them into the front room. Lapsi had dragged Pyrs’ pallet from behind the map cabinet and pushed it near the woodstove. Gaura made a nest between the woodstove and the wall and settled into it, a series of sighs and small groans announcing her progress. Kieve helped the soldiers push cloths into the spaces around the door and the window. Puwan took the first watch and sat bundled in a chair with his feet propped on the stove. Glyn snored. Kieve lay awake, listening to the wind screaming along the stones.

  Jenci had taken her all over Koerstadt, filling her bad-tempered silence with his own exuberance. To the Lords Council House to deliver a map, just a few months after he had transferred to the Mapmakers section. Down wide streets, stone cobbles streaked with red mud, bordered by trees whose dense canopies threw down cool shadows. Behind the trees the facades of buildings rose straight from the streets, blank walls lush with cascades of vividly flowering vines and set, randomly, with small square windows. Jenci’s voice boomed between the walls, following the complicated melody of a song from Teneleh, perhaps, where they wove the cadences of the sea into everything they sang. She remembered his hair mostly brown, the outlands tan still fading from his skin, his braids tipped with an incongruous collection of small toys. When they stopped to let a wagon pass, she stepped closer to him and put her arm around his waist. Jenci had been still for a moment and she realized now that for that moment he had not even breathed. Then he clasped her to his side and resumed his melody.

  Glyn woke and traded places with Puwan, who snored less than she did. Gaura groaned as she turned over and bunched her nest more comfortably around her stomach. Pyrs would be far from Sterk, in safety. In safety. She wondered what he would look like, grown, and whether his hair would darken. The wind lessened for a while, then shifted and picked up again. Glyn hummed a tune Kieve didn’t recognize, that seemed to have no beginning and no end, just a rill of aimless melody wandering through the constant sound of the wind. Beyond it she heard again Jenci’s cheerful, liquid song.

  She slept, and in her sleep she looked for him and found instead a vast white plain spread to curving horizons under a curved white sky. Frowning, she turned in a circle, her abacus and pen in her hands. How could she map this extended nothingness? The ground at her feet was featureless as ice. She pulled the scarf from her neck and let it hang from her fingertips. When she moved her hand the scarf stayed upright, dark but colorless. She turned to look behind her and saw a trail of her clothing, one boot and another, her breeches, her shirt, each item standing above the featureless plain and the paces from each to each marked like tattoos along her thighs, and she realized that she was naked and faced a world of blankness left to map. She turned her head from it and opened her eyes to the darkness of the room and the glow from the door of the woodstove. Her shoulders felt stiff. She rotated them.

  “Rider?”

  “It is nothing,” she whispered back.

  She heard Glyn turn and resettle herself. Kieve leaned forward to add another log to the fire.

  “It is a great honor,” Jenci had told her. “Kieve, ikume, listen to me. The mapmakers, copyists, those who mind the chapter houses, these are all secondary. The Herald Riders are at the top of our guild, and to be a Lord’s Herald Rider is an honor. When it is done you will have your choice of positions in the Guild.”

  “But the Outlands—”

  “Are not open to you. Kieve, to be a Lord’s Rider only five years after your apprenticeship—it is almost unheard of.”

  “But Daenet—”

  “Pah! Kyst asked for him specifically, so how could the Guild refuse?” He touched her chin. “This posting is a great honor. For both of us. I know you will not disappoint the guild, or me. Will you?”

  When Puwan woke, Kieve pulled herself out of the furs and turned up the wick on the lamp.

  Glyn said, “Must be near dawn.”

  Kieve listened for the wind’s direction, went into her bedroom, and cracked open the wooden shutter. Even in the lee of the building the wind was fierce. The sky had lightened to dark grey. Cadoc could die this moment and she would not be able to leave Dalmorat. She pulled the window closed again and returned to the front room as Gaura woke. The servant turned herself onto her hands and knees, and from there clambered to her feet. She shook her dress into place and began folding her bedclothes.

  “There’s food in the pantry,” she said, eyeing the soldiers. “Not much, though.”

  Everyone looked at Kieve, waiting for her directions. She stared back at them. The wind howled.

  “Will you feed us, Gaura?” she said at last, and everyone moved.

  “Of course.” The servant settled her cap and paused to look at Lapsi. “Shall I wake the boy?”

  He lay sprawled in the furs, abandoned to sleep, his eyelids still swollen from crying.

  “No,” Kieve said. While Puwan took Gaura down the blustery hallway to her pantry, Kieve squatted beside Lapsi, balancing on the balls of her feet, and watched his face. He took up twice the space that Pyrs had. Somewhere in this gawky, sullen boy was somebody Jenci chose as an apprentice. She wondered who that was.

  He was, perhaps, thirteen. She tried to remember herself at that age. Just as gawky, taller, still furious. Catching rabbits when no one could see her. Muttering words in Akeguruk into her bed at night when no one could hear, because the harsh, clipped syllables comforted her. Matching her long limbs against Daenet in the practice yard and picking herself up, over and over, determined one day to throw him. In the meantime, on days when he had been particularly merciless, she collected frogs and snakes and slid them between the sheets on his bed. His surprised curses never failed to delight her.

  But he left for Kyst before she could throw him and then she left for her first posting in Brodveld, and now Jenci was dead and the entire world seemed poised to change.

  “He loved you,” Lapsi said. She came back to the present. He stared up at her from the furs. “Even after you were gone, even when he was angry. He said he gave up riding because of you. He stayed in Koerstadt, because you were there. He waited for your letters.” The boy’s voice stayed quiet. “Whatever I did was something you had done first, or you had done better. Whatever I thought was your thought first. Whatever I dreamed...he loved you. And we came here and I thought you would be, that you would be...but you weren’t. And still he loved you, and never saw me at all.”

  She was silent, looking at his angry face.

  “I know,” she said at last. “But he chose you. I was...I was thrust at him, whether he wanted me or not. But he chose you.” She paused. “And I loved him too.”

  “Not enough,” Lapsi insisted.

  She didn’t know what she could say to that. She started to rise.

  “He died because of you.”

  “No.”

  “He did. He came to Dalmorat because of you, he left his room because of you. He died while you were fornicating, while you were too busy to care about him. He’s dead because of you.”

  Anger came so quickly that she couldn’t speak, then she said, “How much could he have loved me? He sent me here.” He raised his arms to shelter his face. She blew out her breath and stood up.

  The other adults looked away. Gaura made vedsuppe on the woodstove. Puwan stood beside her, chopping hunks of dried meat with his belt knife, attentive to the food. Glyn sat by the door. Kieve stared at them all. Only Glyn met her glance. The soldier shrugged, one shoulder lifting and falling, and half-closed her eyes again.

&nbs
p; Kieve unlocked the map cabinet and stopped for a moment, her hands on the scroll map Jenci had made for her. Sitting in the Mapmakers’ Hall in sunlight flooding from the tall windows, thinking of her as he lettered in, with his careful hand, the names of the brooks feeding into the Morat between the capitol and the sea. Jenci decorated the borders of his maps with fantastical or whimsical figures, two-headed animals, pious drawings of the Cheran trinity with their feet on the necks of imaginary beasts. His own peculiar compass rose, in its center the feathered serpent of time, forever consuming its own tail. She had a few of Jenci’s maps among her personal ones, in addition to this new one.

  She put the new scroll aside and lifted out Hovath’s Compendium. Her hands shook. She stroked the book’s leather cover, the ridges of the incised lettering, the smooth gold leaf, while she pushed and shoved her anger into a little room and forced the door closed on it. The shaking stopped. Within the book were all the places she sent her dreams, the borders always more enticing than their known centers. She lifted the Compendium onto a lambskin, wrapping it and tying the bundle, refusing to be tempted to look through it one last time.

  Opening her money pouch, she shook out the coins and counted through them. She had been mistaken: she had twelve capits, one quarter, three stivers and a quent. She wrapped eleven capits in a twist of cloth and tucked it into the lambskin. She made some ink and penned a quick note to Taryn, asking him to hold the eleven capits and those for the Compendium for Unig Innkeeper of Minst, telling him that more money would be coming from Cairun Marubin. She blew the ink dry, folded the note, and slipped it under the cords. The scent of meat broth crept through the room, warming it. Gaura stirred grains into the pot, covered it, and moved it to a corner of the stove. Puwan inspected the inside of the teapot. Lapsi had come off his pallet and hunkered beside the stove, wrapped in the blankets, staring at Kieve. She turned so as not to see him.

  Jenci had to come to Dalmorat of his own will. He had sent her to Dalmorat of his own will, eager to give her prestige of being a Lord’s Rider. He had known what he did.

  She put a small trunk on her worktable. She kept Dalmorat’s maps separate from those for the Guild, and both separate from her private ones. Three years ago Cadoc had suggested that she provide him with a map of Cherek. It was almost finished, with only some details of the islands off Teneleh to ink in. She rolled and wrapped it and put it atop the province maps in the map cabinet. She rested her fingers for a moment on the map of Stormbringer, then put it, with the Guild’s maps and her own, into the small trunk, leaving out the map that showed the route down the Morat to Koerstadt, the one she would need to ride Cadoc’s death to the capitol. She’d have to take Lapsi with her. She rolled the map into a tight scroll and slid it into the pocket in her breeches.

  Bredda would be wise to apprentice Pyrs into the Shadeen Guild. Perhaps Ilach or Braith could vouch for the boy—Bredda would think to ask. They would do well by him. Perhaps he might write to her. It wouldn’t be difficult, he could write in care of the Guildhouse in Koerstadt, the letter would reach her. Wherever she was.

  She put the chest atop the boxes that would go down-river with her. There would be few of them, especially now that Cairun had bought the porcelains and crystal. No hurry for those, Gaura could pack them later.

  The vedsuppe was ready. Gaura had found some dried fruits and added them to the porridge. Kieve took the cup she was offered and raised it to her lips, and Puwan scooped it away from her.

  “Apologies, Rider,” he said. “Ilach’s orders.”

  She frowned. “To starve me?”

  Puwan shook his head and sipped from Kieve’s cup. He held the sip in his mouth for a moment, frowning, then swallowed it and thought about that for a moment, too.

  “You think Gaura would poison me? You helped her make it.”

  “He doesn’t have a choice,” Glyn said, grinning, as Puwan handed the cup back. “Ilach’ll flay him if he doesn’t. And our Puwan is a picky eater, he is.”

  Puwan glowered at her. “Woof,” she said to him, then looked quickly at Kieve. “Pardon, Rider.”

  Kieve shrugged, remembering Isbael’s poisoned dog. She sipped and watched them over the lip of the cup. They ate the vedsuppe from cups and pots and bowls, letting it warm their hands before putting it to their lips. Steam wreathed their faces.

  “What else are you to do for me?” she said.

  “The standard,” Glyn said, looking up from her bowl. “Dog your footsteps, wake while you sleep, taste your food, check your boots for assassins, inspect the chamber pot—”

  “The chamber pot...”

  “It’s why one of us is a woman,” Glyn said. “In case you’re shy about that.”

  Lapsi snorted.

  Kieve took another sip. “How do I end this?” she said.

  “You don’t, Rider,” Puwan said. “Well, you can talk to Ilach of course. But not otherwise.”

  A gust pushed at the heavy wooden door, rattling the hinges. For a moment it felt as though the world was crowding in on her, faces and bodies and no solitude to be had at all.

  “Then I suppose we’ll have to visit the commander, won’t we?” she said, trying to keep her voice light.

  Glyn raised her eyebrows, red above the pale green of her eyes. “In this storm, Rider?”

  “Yes. The boy and Gaura can stay here.” She pulled on her cloak.

  Puwan and Glyn exchanged glances before layering on their cloaks. Gaura shook her head and collected the cups and bowls and piled them into the pot.

  “Boy, help me with the door,” she said. Lapsi unwound himself from his cocoon of blankets and went to the door. He turned the latch. The wind grabbed the door from his hands and slammed it into the room and against the wall. Gaura dropped the pots and screamed. Kieve whipped around.

  A large knife pinned a black, doll-like figure to the door. Lapsi backed away from it as the soldiers came around him. Glyn peered down the corridor while Puwan jerked the knife free and pulled the figure from the door. They pushed the door closed. Puwan tossed the figure on the table.

  It was a puppet, a Maccus like the one the puppeteers used save that someone had broken off its nose, painted its hair brown, and wrapped it in black fur. The Riders’ guildmark had been crudely painted on the puppet’s chest, just above where the knife, driven through the figure, had pinned it to the door.

  “No one out there and snow blown over any tracks,” Glyn said. “Recently done, though, after Puwan and your woman went to get the food.”

  Gaura started gasping. Puwan pushed a chair behind her and helped her sit.

  “Are you having a baby?” he demanded.

  She shook her head. Glyn called him a name and pushed him aside and knelt by the servant.

  “You’re just upset,” she said. “Hold your breath.”

  Gaura clutched at the soldier’s hand and shook her head again.

  “Fine. It’s all right. Here.” Glyn pulled Gaura’s apron up over her head. “Now just breathe. You’ll be okay. Just breathe.”

  “The dagger?” Kieve said.

  Puwan frowned. “Common kitchen knife. It won’t help identify anyone.”

  Gradually Gaura’s breathing eased. She pushed the apron from her face and turned to find Kieve.

  “You can’t leave me here, mistress,” she said. “It was that man, I know it, the one who brought the packets, the one who said, who said that he’d, that he would—” She wrapped her arms across her belly. “I can’t stay here alone, mistress, you mustn’t make me.” She looked terrified. The soldiers and Lapsi all looked at Kieve, once again waiting for her direction. She looked at the Maccus, her lips tight.

  “No, you can’t stay here,” she said at last. “You can come with us through the storm. You can stay in the barracks.”

  Gaura nodded, her lower lip caught between her teeth. Kieve looked at Lapsi until he nodded, too. She dug through her trunk and found four snow-masks. Gaura said she didn’t need one and bundled herself in woole
n mufflers until only a slit remained for her eyes.

  They made a strange parade, roped together, anchoring each other down the steps through blasts of sleet and wind. At the base of the staircase Kieve found the first of the tethering rings set into the wall. She led them from one ring to the next. Glyn brought up the rear while Lapsi and Puwan bracketed Gaura. They staggered to the small utility door let into the bigger stable door. Kieve dragged the door open and they stumbled inside.

  Lud had moved the horses as far into the stable as he could, away from the storm’s cold. They moved restively, uneasy with the noise and wind. Stable hands walked between the stalls, soothing them. They turned to watch as Kieve’s band passed. Traveler whickered. Kieve stopped beside Lud and pushed her snow-mask up her forehead.

  “You’re headed for the barracks?” Lud said. “If Ilach’s sending to the kitchens, we could use more food. Grains, some meat. We can cook it here.” His eyebrows rose. “Cadoc?”

  “Nothing new last night,” she said.

  “My news is fresher, but no change.” He hesitated. “Rider? I am grieved for your guildmaster.”

  “Thank you,” she said, and walked on.

  Hay was stacked against the far wall. A gap between the bundles led to the passageway. Children popped out of the hay to giggle or stare at them as they went by. None of them had bright golden hair. Kieve turned her face, impatient with herself.

  She led the way through the gap and into the passageway. Over the years parts of the outer wall had been removed to other uses in the castle. Wind howled through the breaches; cold crept into her cloak and burned at her nose and cheeks. The light faded. They pushed on, linked each to the other by hands on shoulders and by rope. She trailed her fingers over the stone walls and counted paces. Perhaps Bredda and Pyrs were telling stories, or sleeping. Playing games. The storm would keep them hidden and safe. He still had her Riders Token. Perhaps he wore it around his neck, as he had worn his necklet earlier.

  The darkness lifted and greyed as the passage fell apart at the lee corner of the barracks. They stopped so that Kieve and Puwan could check the ropes. Kieve reached Gaura, who stood very still.